F.H.U.W. Orlik Haul 12/15/23

[theOshkoshModeler]

Hello all!

My most recent Orlik order and first bulk haul arrived at my doorstep this afternoon, 59 days later (boats are slow, definitely spending the extra for priority/air mail in the future).
The anticipation was high on this one for one specific item which you'll see soon.

The unboxing-
(1), (2): Box and shipping label shown as arrived (thankfully in excellent condition), top and bottom. Boxcutter for scale.
(3), (4): Box contents before unwrapping. Top shows all of the wire sets atop cardboard, a mystery box at right, and a few EPS blocks to secure everything. Bottom shows the back cover of an A3 magazine.

The accessories-
(5): The first items out of the box are the wires, an included flyer with a promo code on back, and the mystery box opened to reveal the canopy sets.
(6): All but one of the kits I ordered had canopy sets available for purchase. The B-25/PBJ canopy set seems a little bent; hopefully the curvature of the canopy sheet in back (for the waist gun windows) wasn't affected by shipping.
(7): I ordered all 10 wire thicknesses available: 0.1, 0.25, 0.3, 0.4, 0.6, 0.7, 0.8, 0.9, 1, and 2 mm (frustratingly no 0.5 mm)
(8), (9): Enough cardboard to rebuild the Bastille: 25 pieces of 1 mm and 5 pieces each of 0.5 and 1.5 mm.

The kits-
(10): Both A4 kits shown: Orlik's new (ish) F-16C Block 32 #167 with canopy set and GPM's classic F-104C 'Starfighter' #370 in USAF colors (one of my white whales and the reason I couldn't wait for this order to arirve).
The F-104C seems to have sold out fast (although I have no idea being only eight and long away from paper modeling when it released) as the subsequent Bundesmarine F-104G #380 is in ready supply by the manufacturer yet this one is nowhere to be found.
It's a miracle that I was even able to obtain it being one of the secondhand listings of older kits that get snapped up by collectors.
Unfortunately this one came with only the matte finish, however the cardboard parts sheets are still there. The canopy set was not available either; I'll order one from GPM in the near future.

(11): Orlik PBJ-1H '8-Ball' #060 shown with canopy set. Some of you veteran forum members may remember Mike's build thread all the way back when this kit released.
(12): Orlik XP-61E/F-15 'Reporter' #067 shown with canopy set. I ordered the gloss version; it'll pair nicely with the Orlik B-25 I ordered from a third-party vendor recently.

I'll go over all of these kits (and their real-life inspirations) in more detail in separate review threads.

(13): All items shown together. Made for a great and exciting haul with a few classic kits.

[Don Boose]

Thanks for the detailed narrative and the images. It was fun watching the models and accessories appear. Goo wishes for the builds.

I keenly remember Mike Scalingi's PBJ-1H build. I wish he was still with us in the forum, but apparentlky he is well and busy with his architectural business.

Don